Dental caries status and treatment needs of 12-13 year-old children in Sichuan Province, Southwestern China

Objective To update information on the dental caries status of children liv ing in the Southwestern part of China for planning appropriate dental care services and to obtain information on caries level in rural areas, Method A ll first year students studying in seven secondary schools (two in urban, t wo in peri-urban and three in rural areas) in Sichuan Province were surveye d. The students were clinically examined in their schools using procedures and diagnostic criteria recommended by the World Health Organization Result s A total of 1,542 children, 12-13 years of age, were examined of which 660 , 519 and 363 were from the urban, peri-urban and rural schools respectivel y. The prevalence of caries experience was highest in urban children (30%), followed by peri-urban children (21%) and lowest in rural children (13%). The respective DMFT index scores for the urban, peri-urban and rural childr en were 0.62, 0.38 and 0.18. The differences were statistically significant (P<0.001). The major component of the DMFT index was untreated decay (DT) in all three areas. Conclusion There was a clear trend of increasing preval ence and severity of dental caries in children as the survey sites moved fr om rural, through peri-urban to urban areas. Thus, estimates of dental cari es in Chinese child populations of this age based on surveys conducted in u rban areas will probably lead to gross over-estimation as over 80% of the p eople live in rural areas.